Goodwitch Apprentice
by 88mph
Summary: Harry follows Sirius into the veil hoping to save him. He loses Sirius on the way and ends up in a world plagued with monsters where teenagers train to become hunters to fight the darkness. He lands in the hands of two enforcers for the local mob, which is unlucky, but that they are cute twins his age is lucky. Now he has to do a balancing act between the darkness and the hunters.
1. Chapter 1

AN: If you're unfamiliar with RWBY I highly recommend doing a google search for it. It's a new anime that is just launching off and so far it's very entertaining. I'm writing this because episodes can't come out fast enough and it will be nice to drum up some support for the show this way. 

Since the show is so new and at time of writing this only 4 episodes have been out, a lot of what I write will be AU because I will be guessing at the internal workings of the show.

**Out of the Death Veil and into Grim Vale**

Sirius was falling, any second the veil would swallow him. Harry leapt to his godfather hoping beyond hope to catch him. But even as he took his first step Sirius was disappearing into the grays and blacks inside the arch. There were shouts around him to stop but he didn't truly hear them. Sirius was just beyond the veil, if he ran fast enough he could catch him, he could bring him back. With that thought he jumped through.

For a horrible moment that felt like an eternity he was frozen in blackness. Then motion returned as if it had never stopped. "Sirius!" he screamed as he appeared midair in a street. Street lamps were casting amber light on the brick walls of houses and the asphalt. The sudden lack of noise gave Harry more pause than the change in scenery.

He looked around wildly hoping to find Sirius. He found two girls staring at him. From their features he guessed them to be twins, one dressed in a red theme and the other in white. At their feet were several men quietly groaning. One of them tried to pull himself to his hands and knees. The girl in white raised her foot and brought her sharp heel down on him. There was a snap of bone breaking and the man screamed.

"Miltia, shut him up," the girl in white said walking toward Harry. The girl in red nodded and viciously kicked the screaming man's face, knocking him out. Harry noted that red seemed to have bladed weapons on her hands.

"Did you see a man just come through here? He's a bit taller than me, long hair and a short beard?" Harry asked the girl in white. A part of him was thinking that he had stepped into something dangerous but was unwilling to let it deter him from finding Sirius.

"No, you're the only one who appeared out of thin air. I'm Melanie, who're you?" she asked in a bored voice but Harry could see the interest in her eyes. Any other time he would be excited that a pretty girl was looking at him like that.

"I'm Harry. You're sure you haven't seen someone else? He was right in front of me," he pressed.

"Yup, we've been here for I'd say at least fifteen minutes, cleaning out the competition for our territory. Are you with them?" girl in white asked.

"What?" Harry demanded in frustration. "No, of course not. I don't even know where I am, much less who they are."

Suddenly the girl in white blurred and Harry found her wickedly sharp three-inch heel at his Adam's apple. His eyes widened behind his glasses at the speed of the girl. He took in the long laced boots to the smooth skin exposed beneath her skirts and admired her balance. She stood as if she could keep her bladed heel at his throat all day. "You should step away before you hurt yourself," Harry said, thinking that he wasn't dealing with muggles. No muggle could move that fast.

"What if I don't feel like it, Harry, was it? Now tell me again what you're doing here," she said.

Harry, already tensed from the fight with Death Eaters, pointed the wand at her from his waist and called out, "Expelliarmus!" Melanie flew back the length of the street. Her sister, Harry figured from the facial similarity, jumped in the air and easily grabbed Melanie.

The girl in red stepped in front of Melanie, her red wrist claws glinting in the lamplight. "You have a dust weapon. Never seen one so unimpressive looking," she said, looking worriedly at her sister who was still dazed.

Harry pondered the term 'dust weapon' for a long moment, never hearing his wand described that way. _I must be a long way from home_, he thought to himself. "Look, I don't want any trouble. I just want to find my godfather, I think he came this way."

"Like Melanie said, we didn't see anyone. You're the only one who showed up. Are you a huntsman, by the way?" she had a sort of wistful edge to her voice.

Harry shook his head. "I don't know what that is." He cursed internally at losing Sirius. And to top it off he had landed in some odd place where people weren't surprised by magic but had different terms for it. "Hey where is this place?"

"Vale. Where are you from?" she said. 

Harry weighed what to say as he saw the beaten down men slowly get up and escape. The girls seemed to notice but were much more curious about him. "Most recently from London. How far would you say London is from Vale?"

The twins exchanged a look. The one in white, Melanie decided to speak. "Never heard of London... You're not from around here, are you?" she said, checking out his clothes in a very obvious way.

Harry realized he was wearing robes while the girls were in clearly muggle clothing. "How can you not know London?" he asked but then quieted as he caught a glimpse of the sky." There were two moons in the sky. One whole and the other with part of it broken. "Dear Merlin...I'm really not from around here." He slumped to the ground where he stood, simply staring at the sky. "You have two moons." He stared at the sky.

The girl in red, Miltia, shot her sister a worried look. Melanie shrugged helplessly and walked back to the boy with her sister. Miltia laid a hand on his shoulder and asked gently, "You've never seen the moons?"

Some part of Harry knew he should be doing damage control and coming up with an excuse but he was too stunned. "Where I come from there's only one moon."

Melanie gave a put upon sigh when she saw her gentler twin's frown. "Alright, you're coming with us," she said in her bossy yet bored tone. "If we leave you here Miltia is going to worry herself sick."

The boy stood up shakily with Miltia's help. "You don't even know me," he said.

"I'm Melanie and she's Miltia, you mess with us and I will slice your throat. Got it, Lightning?" The girl in white put her hands on her hips and fixed him with her most arrogant look.

"Name's Harry, not Lightning," he mumbled but let Miltia guide him.

"But you have such an interesting scar... Maybe you're a huntsman and you got into a fight and have amnesia, that would explain why you don't remember the moons," Miltia said eagerly in her soft voice.

Harry wanted to deny her the misconception but decided it was a good enough excuse. No doubt wherever he was people would think he's a loon if he kept on saying that until a few minutes ago his reality only had one moon. "Maybe you're right."

"Great, a brain damaged stray, Miltia," Melanie said with a snort. "Mom will blow."

It was the shy twin's turn to snort. "You mean if she sees anything beyond her drugs. We'll just tell him he's one of her hallucinations."

Harry was surprised to hear the amount of bitterness come from the red and kind twin as he had dubbed her in his head. "I don't want to make trouble for you with your mum."

"Don't worry about it. Between her visits to the hospital for her hypochondria and to the temple for her paranoia she won't notice," Melanie explained, her heels going click clack on the asphalt.

Harry plodded along, not really noticing his surroundings but wondering more about whom he was putting his faith in. Which reminded him, "So those guys back there, were they picking on you or something?"

"Eh, just the usual attempt at invading our territory to see if we've softened so they could move in all the way. Miltia and I took care of it. It's getting boring," she said.

"Your territory?" Harry asked, wondering how two cutely dressed girls could take on thugs that he'd seen laid out. Although, the speed with which Melanie had moved and the claws on Miltia's hands certainly were dangerous.

Miltia shrugged next to him. "We work for the mob, the area around the club is our responsibility," she said.

"Oh," Harry said, wondering what to make of that. They'd basically outright told him they were criminals, unless 'mob' meant something else in Vale. He decided to treat the situation as he did when he'd found out about the wizarding world and just take in everything.

"Everyone's gotta survive somehow," Miltia said.

"How old are you by the way?" Melanie asked.

"Fifteen," Harry answered.

"Same as us, cool," Melanie said with a smile. Harry thought she looked very pretty with a happy expression on her face.

Unbeknownst to the three a Huntress leapt from roof to roof, following them. She had seen Harry's entrance from nowhere and heard his conversation with the twins. After watching Harry disappear into an apartment building with them, she made notes and sent them straight up the chain to Glynda Goodwitch. A possible amnsesiac with unknown dust abilities would interest Goodwitch.

AN I'll try to do this in episode form. So this was one whole sequence. Next will be Harry settling in Grim world. I really liked the twins from their very brief scene in the trailers, so I'm adopting them in this story. Now go check out RWBY if you haven't already!


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

The sun poured orange light through the patio window on the fifteenth floor apartment. The light washed out everything but Harry kept looking out at the horizon, his eyes squinted. The apartment had two bedrooms, one for the girls' mother and the other shared by the twins. He had slept the night on the floor of their room. Nightmares had awoken him when the sky was still purple and violet in the very early morning light.

He turned away from the blinding sunlight to look at the rest of his surroundings. Pictures were pasted to the wall, as if frames were too much work. The twins were featured in quite a few pictures. Their green eyes sparkling from under their hime cut black hair, usually in the arms of a brown haired older man with same green eyes as them. A woman was present as well, their mother, with black hair and black eyes, and a soft smile on her face. They looked like a happy family.

But then Harry's eyes moved to pictures from which their father was absent and only sullen and cool faces stared back from them. Their mother disappeared from the pictures, and the girls had fewer and fewer images. The last one which showed them closest to their current age had them in their white and red themed dresses.

A different man was featured in this picture. He was tall and well built, a short beard framed his square face and red glasses hid his eyes. For some reason Harry disliked the man on sight. Maybe it was because the girls were hanging off his arms like adornments. After having met them last night and seeing their power Harry was not impressed with them acting like fashion accessories for this man, whoever he was.

There was noise behind him which broke him out of his reverie. An older version of the girls' mother he had seen in the photos had walked into the kitchen. A few grey streaks peppered her hair. She was moving from fridge to stove with a nervous sort of energy, hands picking up and dropping utensils at random. Harry stood, frozen, not knowing if he should introduce himself and startle the woman or hope she didn't notice him at all.

"Mom! Stop making noise! It's too early!" Melanie shouted. Melanie and Miltia emerged from the room, one wearing a white nightie and the other red pajamas. Harry grinned in amusement at their obsession with color coordination.

"Oh! You scared your old mother!" the woman shouted back. She finally noticed Harry standing there and gave him a confused look. "Who is this?"

"That's figment, Mom," Miltia said with a yawn.

"Yup, a figment of your imagination," Melanie continued as she plopped down at the dining table.

Harry awkwardly looked at the woman who had fixed him with a dazed yet intense look. "He has green eyes, just like -" she began.

"Just like Bernard," Miltia and Melanie finished for their mother in unison.

The woman shuffled up to Harry and held his face in her hands. Harry leaned back a little to get away from her but her hold was strong. "You look so much like him…my husband was a figment of my dreams too. Now, don't you go getting my daughters pregnant, young man!"

"What?" Harry squeaked.

"Mom!" the twins yelled in outrage.

"Well that's how it starts, girls. One day he's in your dreams, the next you're round with his babies," the woman said shuffling back to the fridge and grabbing a block of cheese. She ignored her daughters' protests as she put the cheese in her purse. "I have to go to the temple. It's time for the monthly donation."

"You _could_ monthly donate to our rent, you know. So maybe your daughters could go back to school," Miltia muttered from where her head rested on her folded arms at the table.

"Goodbye girls, goodbye Figment," the mom waved and left the apartment.

"Argh!" Miltia snapped. "She could've made us breakfast at least."

"Did you really want her to give you a block of cheese for breakfast?" Melanie deadpanned.

"_Did you really want her to give you a block of cheese for breakfast?"_ Miltia mocked her sister back.

"Whoa! Wait, I'll make breakfast," Harry said before the twins could start fighting. He didn't realize the 'shy' Miltia could be so catty in the morning.

Harry began puttering around the kitchen looking for utensils and ingredients. Luckily the new place wasn't too different than what he was used to cooking wise. The stove was powered by something he wasn't too clear on but it produced fire. Fairly soon he had eggs frying, bread toasted, butter and chocolate milk ready. The girls chose to continue their sleep at the table as he prepped breakfast.

"Here, it's ready." He laid out the food in front of them and sat at the table. The twins made appreciative noises and dug in. After a few minutes Harry asked something that had been on his mind, "Why did she say I looked like your Dad? I've seen his pictures, we look nothing alike."

"It's not just you." Melanie rolled her eyes. "Anyone she sees with green eyes reminds her of him."

"They were really in love…she can't let go," Miltia added between bites. "She keeps going to the temple hoping her prayers will bring him back or at least keep the Grimm away."

Harry felt bad about asking but since they were being so open he pressed on. "What happened to him?"

Melanie drank her chocolate milk and gestured Miltia to continue the story. "He was a Hunstman. He got involved in taking down a Grimm nest far up north in the wilderness five years ago. Officially he's missing in action."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Harry said. The twins shrugged and went back to their meals. "What is a Grimm?"

The twins shared a bewildered look. "You really have lost your memory, haven't you?" Melanie said.

"They're monsters, beowolves, hydras, you know?" Miltia said. "Does any of this ring a bell?"

"Sort of." Harry shifted in his chair uncomfortably.

"Maybe it was some weird dust experiment that scrambled your brain. How else would you just appear out of nowhere?" Melanie fixed him with a frown.

"I don't know," Harry said helplessly. He couldn't quite tell them about the veil in the Department of Mysteries and how he'd run through it.

"Well, you know, like on TV shows sometimes if you get into a violent situation your training comes back and you have a breakthrough with memories," Melanie said in faux nonchalance.

Miltia grinned. "Yeah, that sounds like a plan."

"What? What plan?" Harry asked. The devilish look being shared between the twins made him really worried.

"Time to train, Lightning!" Melanie said.

"I thought we were going with Figment." Miltia pouted.

"Hey!" Harry tried to interject but was ignored.

(Scene break)

The twins changed into workout clothes and led Harry to their apartment building's courtyard. It was hemmed on three sides by the apartments but one side was open to the street. There was a flat grassy area where the girls started stretching. Harry tried not to stare but it was hard not to admire their lithe bodies.

"Alright, watch carefully, see if this jogs your memory," Melanie said. She leapt into the air spinning her legs in furious kicks and ran through a choreographed set of moves.

"Wow," Harry breathed to himself. "That is amazing."

When Melanie came to the end of her kata, Miltia seamlessly began hers which was more focused on punches. The girl jumped and tumbled like her sister as well. The speed with which they moved left Harry in awe.

"So? Anything?" Miltia asked.

"Err beyond thinking that both of you are incredible, no I don't remember anything." Harry felt like a heel going along with the amnesia charade. The girls seemed to be really trying to help him.

Melanie nodded to Miltia, sending a message Harry couldn't understand. Miltia ran at him suddenly with a cocked fist. Harry dodged the first punch, right into taking the second one in his side, a third under his chin, a fourth in his stomach, and a leg swipe brought him to the ground.

Harry groaned on the ground. Miltia and Melanie stood above him in disappointment. "That was pathetic, Harry," Miltia said. "I was so sure your elite Huntsman training would kick in."

"You have to have had training. You have a dust weapon!" Melanie stomped her foot.

"Well, I'm bloody sorry, alright!" Harry spat, getting up.

Melanie sighed. "Well this ruins my plans about getting you on our boss's pay roll as an enforcer like us."

"Oh," Harry said realizing they were beating on him for some sadistic reason.

"Well, hold on, not all's lost. Harry can cook. Maybe we can get him to work in the kitchen at The Club. Best we don't tell anyone about his weapon, though," Miltia said.

"Yeah, he can't defend himself as he is. The others might rob him," Melanie said.

Neither girl saw the ire of their newfound project grow. They didn't realize something was wrong until following a loud bang they were wrapped in ropes. They tried to shout but found their voices gone. Harry loomed over them. "Can't defend myself, right?"

He released them from the ropes and the silencing spell. It assuaged his ego but he knew that if he didn't have the element of surprise he was in trouble. The girls could move far too fast.

"What in the endless void are you?" Melanie asked. "I've never seen dust used that way."

Miltia brushed herself off. "That was pretty cool but, Harry, your reaction speed when I attacked you was very bad. I think you still need training."

"And we could do with a new challenge. Going up against someone who uses dust like you would be fun." Melanie smiled.

"Right," Harry said, agreeing happily. "And maybe later we can see if I can get a job cooking, yeah?"

Melanie smirked at him and by now Harry had learned to read her a little bit. He jumped back just as Melanie flew into the air aiming a spinning kick at his face. "Tarantallegra!" he shouted.

Miltia's eyes bugged out at her sister dancing like a loon apparently without any control. Peals of her laughter echoed in the courtyard along with Melanie cursing Harry and begging him to stop.

(Chapter end)

AN: So a little more set up and development of the twins. I really do like their mom, I hope to keep the angst and humor she brings balanced. And now Harry will working for the mob. They call him Da Cook…. Or something. _

And new episode tonight!


	3. Chapter 3 Haunted

Chapter 3

**Haunted**

Two weeks later found Harry working in The Club for a gangster named Junior. Harry had recognized him as the man he had disliked in the photo at the girls' place. So far the man had stayed away from him after introducing him to the kitchen crew.

Harry was now standing by the swinging doors to the kitchen during his break. He watched as the girls socialized with the clientele and managed the club's security. It was odd seeing grown men and older boys taking their orders from two petite girls. But in the hierarchy of the gang strength trumped everything – at least at the thug level. Junior answered to someone half his size who was powerful monetarily and had the right connections. Harry had carefully stayed away from that man's notice as well.

He sighed and wiped the sweat off his brow. After two weeks he was no closer to knowing what to do. The maps the girls had shown him of the world were totally different than the geography he knew. So his hope that wherever he had landed was a hidden society like that of witches and wizards was dashed. He was well and truly in a different world.

Worry for his friends and the war ate at him. He needed to know if his friends made it out alive. He wished there were someone like Dumbledore who could tell him how to get back home. Unfortunately there wasn't a clear 'Grand Sorcerer' type figure in Vale.

Dust was the magic and electricity of the new world. It was used to power the stove in the girls' home and used like magic. The first time Harry had seen magic like that he'd been struck speechless.

The girls' were showing him programs on their holo-screen. A combat music performance came on. The singer cum fighter was a girl around his age with snowy white hair and ice blue eyes. She sang and battled a giant suit of armor using a magically empowered rapier. Of course in the new world it was considered a Dust weapon, but Harry knew magic when he saw it.

The girl had moved fast as light, conjured ice and fire, and withstood the power of the mechanized knight. Apparently she had done all this with Dust manipulation according Melanie and Miltia.

After watching her Harry had become hopeful that there might be a Dust expert out there who could help him. But skills at the level of the performer, Weiss Shnee, were only taught in specialized schools. Fat chance of him getting enough money to attend one of those.

Harry felt a shiver and a sense of hyperawareness settle on him. It had been happening with increasing frequency ever since he had come through the veil. At first it felt like his general ability to sense magical objects, which all witches and wizards share. But recently he would become intensely aware of people around himself and any energy flow like that of Dust use.

Just then searching out what had triggered his hyperawareness led Harry to making eye contact with a blonde in an alcove table. It was the second time in the last two weeks he had seen her. She was middle aged, wore oval glasses and her flawless skin was exposed from her beautiful face to the deep scooped top she wore. Harry felt trapped in her stern green eyes just like last time and wrenched himself away from staring at her. He turned and went through the swing doors to the kitchen, ending his break early.

The woman unnerved him for some reason. He felt like she was purposefully there for him.

(Scene Break)

The blonde woman, named Glynda Goodwitch, contemplated the boy she had been observing. Once again when she had used a Dust spell in his vicinity he had perked up like a dog. His instincts were that of a long time student of Dust manipulation. However at other times he became wary even when she wasn't trying to get a reaction. The Huntress she had watching him had observed the same thing.

She brought out her tablet and played clips in the shadowed alcove. They were surveillance video her agent had collected after planting cameras in the club and other places he occupied. The current stream showed the subject, Harry Potter, using his Dust weapon to clean the kitchen. Another clip showed him transmutating old newspapers into a trashcan to use while he cooked.

She frowned in thought at the show of extreme skill for something so mundane. She wondered if he could use Dust transmutation for combat like she herself did. As one of the foremost experts in transmutation of energy and objects she was deeply curious. Moving on to the next clip she watched him use his weapon in spars with the twin enforcers.

The results of his spells were odd to say the least. Majority of them were silly, like exhausting his opponents by forcing them into a laughing fit. Yet another had one of the twins dancing uncontrollably. A third had the girl's hair growing ten feet long and tying her up in knots. She couldn't argue with the results but the sheer frivolousness of his manipulations rubbed her the wrong way. Not to mention that as far as she knew such effects were impossible with Dust manipulation.

Harnessing Dust meant using nature's wrath. The hunger of fire, the sudden devastation of lightning, the fury of wind; such things were what one guided with Dust. Giggling fits and hair lengthening certainly didn't fit in. Yet Goodwitch was intrigued, not only by Potter's appearance out of thin air but also his skills.

(Scene Break)

The gym was in the basement of a high rise. A great open area was divided in different sections. One corner was covered in hardwood floors where Melanie and Miltia typically taught and practiced their martial arts. Punching bags hung in another corner around a boxing ring. The rest of the place was given over to weights and weight machines Harry had no understanding of. He had never been to a gym.

His lack of experience showed much to his embarrassment. He was lying on a bench trying to do presses, with Melanie and Miltia overseeing. Melanie sat at a bench next to him while Miltia spotted him. Both girls had their hair pulled back in ponytails and had gym shorts on in their respective white and red colors.

Melanie had her face resting on a fist with a glum look. "C'mon, Harry, how do you expect to save a demure damsel if you can't even lift this much?" she asked in her usual bored tone.

Harry gasped out, "What does it matter? There's nothing damsel or demure like about you." Melanie retaliated and dug her toe in his side just as he brought the bar to his chest. "Ow! Do you want me to drop the bar?!" he grunted at her.

"Ne, Figment, my mother could lift more than you. Why don't you try harder and stop annoying my sister," Miltia said in a concerned voice.

"Your mum is powered by crazy pills, I can't compete against that," Harry said as he tried to rack the weight. To his horror Miltia started leaning on the bar forcing it back down toward his neck.

"Only we can make fun of our insane mother, Harry," Miltia said.

"Ok, ok, sorry. Stop trying to kill me," Harry begged. Melanie snickered to his side offering no help. "C'mon you're supposed to be the nice twin." Miltia let up and Harry breathed in relief. His arms were shaking from the effort.

"Oi!" unnamed thug from the club shouted from a few weigh machines down. "Why don't you girls come hang out with real men? Stop wasting time on that weakling cook." His boys laughed and took a hit of their protein shakes as if they were doing shots at the bar.

Unbidden memories exploded at the forefront of Harry's mind. They were of a young boy being held down on the toilet at an orphanage. Older boys taunted him for being weak and said it was his fault that he wasn't strong enough to push them back. Harry felt the young boy's rage and his helplessness. He felt the promise the boy made in his soul never to be weak. Hate, painful hate, erupted in Harry at the memories.

He felt magic tingle on his skin and burn through his veins. Memories of the same boy, a little older, showed him using this feeling in his body to curse his tormentors. Harry wanted to reach out like that boy had and cause those idiots calling him weak pain. But he didn't. Instead he massaged the scar on his head that had begun to sting.

So lost was he in memories of someone else that he didn't notice when the older boy and his cronies had come over. Miltia and Melanie were ignoring them. The boy grabbed the front of Harry's shirt and Harry, who was still somewhat lost in the haze of what he had seen, reacted. He grabbed the much stronger boy's wrist with his hand and squeezed.

The boy fell to his knees screaming as smoke started rising from where Harry was clenching the boy's wrist. Harry felt the boy's bones move sickeningly under his palm and snap. One of his friends threw a haymaker at Harry and again Harry simply reacted. He stepped around and shot out a back kick hitting the other in his chest. The boy flew as if he had been cursed with a repelling hex.

The smashing of the mirror when the boy hit it brought Harry back to his senses. The boy on his knees was screaming and had tears of pain in his eyes. His wrist was broken and the skin burned. The other was holding his ribs and moaning. There was a long moment of stunned silence then their group of friends tried to make a move.

"Stop!" Melanie snapped. "You started it, Harry ended it. If this goes further I'll get involved. Do you want that?" The boys grumbled but backed off, taking their friends away.

Harry sat heavily on the bench and stared at his hand. The skin of his palm was unblemished. He wished he could say that it was just accidental magic but it really wasn't. His magic had been crawling over his skin and burning in his veins just like the young orphan he had seen in his memories. He had reacted just like that boy would have.

And it felt good. Revenge felt fantastic.

"Wow! Lightning, that was something else," Melanie said quietly.

"Yeah, where did you pull the power to do that?" Miltia asked.

Harry shook his head, trying to dispel the dark satisfaction he was feeling. It felt foreign somehow. "I don't know. I just hate being called weak."

"But, Figment, I was calling you weak all this time. You didn't get motivated, just got more sarcastic." Miltia giggled. Harry laughed along with the twins, wondering how his old friends would've reacted seeing that.

Ron would've been ecstatic at putting the bullies in their place, and Hermione would've looked at him worriedly for falling to their level. It made him ache for their presence.

Melanie sighed deeply and cursed. "There goes keeping a low profile. Now everyone is going to want to test how strong you are. We need to train you even harder. Think you can use Dust to speed up like you did just then?"

Harry thought back to how fast he had stepped and kicked and how his magic had felt. "I'll have to test it, it sort of just happened."

(Scene Break)

Glynda Goodwitch saw the latest feed from the gym the criminals tended to frequent. She was sitting in her office at Beacon with a cup of tea and a stack of admission requests. She turned to look out the tall French windows of her office and contemplate the boy. Unlike his two friends she had noticed that Potter didn't use an obvious Dust source like crystals.

There were of course many ways Dust could be used to enhance speed and strength. It could even cause elemental biological changes in combatants. Yet Potter's use of fire and lightning for his two attacks didn't conform to what she knew.

She smiled to herself as she thought of an applicant. The girl, Yang, was one the strongest candidates for admission. All that remained was their traditional interview. Goodwitch decided to send Yang to The Club for her combat interview in a few weeks time. With luck Potter would fight along the twins, giving Goodwitch more insight into his capabilities.

And more importantly, it would give her an excuse to enter Potter's life.

(Chapter end)

A.N. I'm setting this several months to a full year before what we see in the series. Right now people are applying to Beacon. Next chapter we will see a bigger part for Junior and might be Crimson visits The Club as well.


	4. Chapter 4

**Disposable**

Junior was fuming. He had been working on Melanie and Miltia for years. He had seen their potential to be a knockout set of twins and taken them under his wing. Over their time with him he had built up their debts to him. It was only a little more time before he could call them in. Having twin girlfriends would be awesome and he had been working hard at making it happen. Then out of nowhere a dweeb moved in with them. What's worse, they begged him to give him a job. Still, Junior had consoled himself that he would count this as one more favor they owed him. But now! Somehow the little bastard had put two of his underlings in the hospital!

"Junior, oh Junior!" a voice singsonged.

Junior looked up to find Roman Torchwick. As usual a shiver went up Junior's spine. Torchwick was ruthless and possibly played for the other team, what with the heavy eyeliner he liked. Junior dreaded the thought of Torchwick demanding manpower of a different sort than he was comfortable with. "Roman," he said in a faux gruff voice. He hoped Roman didn't notice how nervous he was.

"Imagine my surprise when I pulled up the van for the cadre of minions I was expecting and find myself two short," Roman said, tapping his cane right under Junior's chin.

Junior groaned. "Damn it!"

"Yes, very much so. You know how I like to keep to a _tight_ deadline." Roman suggestively raised an eyebrow and Junior felt his sphincter clench.

Junior hurriedly took a pull from his drink at the bar to fortify himself. "Two of the boys got beat up and put in the hospital. I don't have any others who are really disposable."

"Tut, tut, Junior. Can't keep scavengers from your territory? What would Crimson say?" Roman smirked.

"She doesn't say anything. It's just _whoosh_ and flames and everything starts burning." Junior waved his arm wildly. "Anyway, it wasn't someone trying to move in our territory. One of the boys in the kitchen beat them up."

Roman blinked at him slowly. "You mean to tell me a dish boy laid up two of your thugs?"

"Well, technically he's one of my cooks." Junior scratched his head sheepishly and tried to ignore the psychotic gleam in Roman's eye.

"Right, _that_ makes it all better. Well then, since he's responsible for my diminished crew send him to fill the gap," Roman said.

Excitement bubbled in Junior. Roman had specifically asked for men who could be wasted without problem. If Harry went on this job there was a good chance he wasn't coming back. And so Junior's roadblock to the affections on the twins would be taken care of. "You got it, Roman!"

(scene break)

Harry transfigured another hamburger meal into a lobster dinner. The other cooks and busboys had long deserted his corner of the kitchen, not liking the red color flashing in his eyes. Harry wiped his brow off the sweat gathering there. Voldemort's memories had been appearing in his mind without warning. Some of them were fairly mundane, like a young Tom Riddle dressing for school, others were severely disturbing and they left him feeling unclean. Trying to keep them away was at best a headache inducing activity and at worst a cause for insomnia.

So Harry was trying a different tactic, what if he could guide what memories appeared? Thinking this Harry had tried to delve into Riddle's magical learning. Somehow the memories that had popped up were of Riddle teaching himself magical cooking. Oddly enough Harry felt his heart go out to the young version of the Dark Lord. The boy had known hunger constantly in the orphanage. The older boys would often steal the food he was given. So once Riddle went to Hogwarts and could enjoy all he could eat he never wanted to be hungry again. Harry had memories of himself feeling the same way his first year, so he could sympathize.

Unfortunately, like everything else, Tom Riddle liked taking things to the extreme. While Harry had never done anything beyond thinking 'wouldn't it be wonderful if I could eat like I eat at Hogwarts every day?' Riddle had tried to make it a reality. Riddle refused to be deprived any longer and developed the palette of a gourmet. In fact Volde-little would have withdrawals and panic attacks if he couldn't be sure he could have the perfect meal.

"Great, just bloody great," Harry groused to himself. With a flick of his wand a delicate sauce streamed from his wand onto the lobster tail. "I couldn't just be cursed with being parselmouth because the Dark Lord was one, now I have an eating disorder too."

"Potter! Is number twenty-three ready?" One of the senior cooks yelled around the shelf of pots and pans. Harry took the plate and brought it to the cook. The man gave him a stupefied look after seeing what was on the plate. "What the Hell is this?"

"Daily special, I'm fresh out of beef patties," Harry said. He patted his stomach which was feeling a little tight after all the food he had indulged in.

The head cool looked at the stack of patties sitting at Harry's station and decided not to call him on it. He'd heard already how the boy had put two enforcers into the hospital. It was always the quiet ones. Counting himself lucky to make it away from the boy with all his bones intact he took the 'daily special.' He had to wonder where the lobster had come from, though. They never ordered any seafood at The Club.

Harry watched the man leave and then grabbed a small bowl of caviar. "Damn you, Voldemort, and your taste in rich foods. I have indigestion now."

(break)

Light flashed in the back of the van every now and then when they passed a streetlight outside. There were three men besides Harry in the back. Harry only knew these three by face and didn't care to know anymore. They were of the same ilk as Dudley Dursley and Piers Polkis. Although in their black suits and matching red sunglasses with hats, they looked a little more presentable. Harry pulled at his own ill-fitting suit that he had been forced into at The Club. He also fingered the red cleaver he had been given.

The cleaver more than anything else made him nervous. He didn't rightly know what he'd gotten himself into but it was easy enough to see that they were up to no good. After starting to work at The Club, Harry had been happy that he hadn't signed up as an enforcer like the twins originally hoped for. At least cooking wasn't anything criminal. Harry really hoped they weren't going to kill someone.

He could always run, Harry thought, but that would mean leaving the twins behind. Their short time together had endeared them to Harry. And he was worried that Torchwick would take out his anger on the girls if Harry betrayed the mob. He looked inwards, hoping for some inspiration from Voldemort's memories. There had to be instructions on how to do a memory charm that he could use to convince all of them that he had done whatever dastardly deed they were off to do.

The other three mobsters in the back of the van were laughing and excitedly coming up with scenarios for what they were off to do. This was their big break as far as they were concerned. If they could impress Roman today, they could move up from being bottom gofers. Their happy celebration suddenly stopped when they heard their last member, the freaky cook moan. They nervously watched the boy as he slammed his head back in the van wall and swore.

"Of course you couldn't just show me opening up a book and reading the spell. You had to be violating…and then, dear Merlin, I didn't need to know that about you," the freaky cook muttered. He opened his eyes and the three thugs gasped. One eye was red and the other green, both were glittering. He smiled at them and said, "Don't mind me, just remembered something I didn't want to."

"Err, sure, we'll stay quiet. Don't want to disturb you," one of them said, and as one they all scooted further down the benches from him.

Harry just sighed.

(scene break)

The parked in an alley across from a high-rise. The top of the building had a giant snowflake logo. Harry recognized it as the symbol of the Schnee corporation. It glowed like a star in the night. If they were there Harry knew that the job had something to do with Dust because that's what the company sold. But given that this looked like the headquarters of the corporation and not a shop, Harry wondered what Roman wanted there.

"Alright, gather around," Roman called them. He held out his cigar and one of them men tripped over himself to light it for him. Harry rolled his eyes but didn't comment. He was more interested in the woman who was standing in the shadows. He could only see the end of her red dress and her glittering anklets. She caught him staring and for a moment Harry saw amber eyes flash before they were shadowed again. "Are you listening dish boy?" Roman grabbed Harry attention.

"Sorry," Harry muttered.

Roman sighed and began again. "Ok, look at this picture. See this crystal? Word is that it's some synthetic hybrid Dust crystal Schnee Corporation has been working on. You'll know it by the fact that it's multicolored."

"Looks like a rainbow crystallized," Harry mused.

"Indeed, and it's probably very volatile. Now, the research head's office is on the fifth floor and the crystal is being kept in his personal safe. You four have the job to break in the safe and bring the crystal. Got it?" Roman looked them in the eyes.

One of the thugs raised his hand and Roman nodded at him impatiently. "We'll be doing this ourselves, Mr. Roman, sir?" he asked.

"Yes," Roman drew the word out. "Do you have a problem with that? Junior said you were ready for more responsibility. Aren't you the one whose granddaddy was famous for picking safes?"

"Yes, o-of course, It's no problem, Mr. Roman!" The man laughed nervously.

Harry frowned to himself in concern. He had heard the man crow about his family's long criminal history before but hardly believed all the super-villain type stories. "Wouldn't the place be heavily defended? Shouldn't we have more information before we head in?" Harry asked.

"Shut up, don't screw this up for us, four-eyes!" one of the men yelled at him. "Don't worry, Mr. Roman, we've got it."

Harry held his tongue and observed Roman instead. The man was giving him a steady look from his one visible eye. The woman in the shadows seemed to shift where she stood but said nothing. Harry instincts were sending him alarm bells. The three guys with him were all fairly young and all were inexperienced. This job didn't sound straightforward at all. What was Roman up to?

"If you're sure get going, you're looking for office 544," Roman said.

Harry followed the group of mobsters who stuck out like a sore thumb. None of them was even trying to act casual or fit in with the other pedestrians. Luckily night had already fallen so they weren't as inconspicuous as they would've been in daylight. All Harry could do was pull the oversized hat he had been given low over his face. He could only hope this way if he were caught on camera they wouldn't be able to make out his face.

(Scene break)

Marble flagstones formed the floor of the lobby, a black lacquered desk sat in the middle of the floor as if it was rock in a white marble sea. One guard was manning it with a newspaper and didn't seem to notice their group. Only a handful of people were coming down off the glass elevators or going up them. One of the thugs made a beeline for the guard.

Harry stepped up quickly and grabbed him by the arm. "What are you doing?"

"Gonna make him take us to the office and open the safe for us," he said, nonplussed.

"Seriously? You're going to attack him where everyone can see us? How likely is it that he knows the code to a _personal_ safe of one of their scientists anyway?" Harry demanded furiously.

"Well, you got a better idea, squirt?"

Harry wanted to put him under the torture curse right there and then but he curbed his darker tendencies. "There is a stairwell. The man is distracted. Let's go up quietly and we can put that other guy's safe breaking skills to the test. No trouble this way."

"Fine, but if it doesn't work, I'm taking it out of your hide," the man said, towering over Harry. Harry wanted to say something back but in the interest of getting away unnoticed he kept quiet.

After climbing several flights of stairs to get to the fifth floor their excitement was noticeably cooled. Harry wasn't the only one being cautious now. It seemed the other guys really didn't want to screw up the heist. They entered onto an empty white corridor. Someone had set the temperature to freezing levels. There wasn't a directory or floor map posted so the gang picked a direction and started walking, following door numbers.

All the doors looked to be made of some metal and had a number pad installed next to them. Harry's sense of unease began to grow at this. None of his partners in crime looked particularly tech savvy. He wondered if anyone could hack through an electronic door. They didn't looked worried so he hoped they had a plan.

Finally the numbers '544' appeared on a double door plate. One of them pressed the large green button on the number pad but the door remained stubbornly shut. Harry felt his spirits rise and was about to suggest they go back. They'd shown up and tried, what else could they be expected to do? But then one of them brought out a gun and shot the panel. Harry shouted in shock but the others took it in stride. They brought out axes and thrust them into the crease of the double door, pushing them apart.

"What's that?" Harry said, looking around wildly, trying to hear over the noise they were making. "Bloody Hell, you've set off the alarm!"

"Grow a pair!" one of them grunted as he put his shoulder into shoving the door open. The doors led into a surgically clean lab with metal examination tables. Machines and equipment that Harry had no recognition of sat on the tables. Some Dust crystals could be seen resting on the tables, locked into harnesses.

"There, the safe!"

This time Harry stayed back as the rest went up to the safe. Seeing how they had dealt with the door he didn't want to be anywhere near it when they blew it up or something. As the guys reached the middle of the lab, holes slid open in the ceiling and gatling guns dropped from them. Harry didn't wait any longer. Even he had seen enough movies despite the Dursleys depriving him to know what would come next. He took out his wand and disillusioned himself even as his heart started to race.

In the seconds it had taken him to cast the spell the guns began whirring and spitting out bullets. The others shot back but one was taken out right away. Harry shielded the other two and hoped that the guns couldn't track him by heat. One of the thugs shot back at the gatling gun and managed to destroy the mount it was hanging from. The other catching on helped him take down the other three.

Harry breathed in relief and dropped his spells before they noticed him. He saw the riddled body of the one who'd gotten caught and felt sorry. The man was stupid but Harry wasn't sure he deserved to be made into Swiss cheese. The smell of blood and death assaulted him making him want to use magic to clear the air.

"Hell, Mr. Roman didn't say anything about this. C'mon, hurry. We'll have to leave Brad behind," one of them said and swiped his eyes to hide the tears.

"I think Roman knew exactly what was going to happen," Harry muttered but it was loud enough.

"_And you_, if you didn't stop me from bringing up the guard we wouldn't be in this mess. He would've told us what was gonna happen!"

"Go to Hell," Harry snapped back. "If Roman had given us more information we would be ok. Kidnapping a guard where everyone can see us is plain stupid."

"Shut up, both of you!" the safe breaker of the group said. "It's all messed up now. Let's just get the job done."

Harry stepped away from the fight and looked around at the damaged equipment. Luckily none of the crystals had been shot. He walked over to the door, expecting someone would be coming shortly. The guns had appeared only a few seconds after the alarm, so maybe the still had time. He stepped out of the lab and disillusioned himself again with the plan to stun anyone who came by. Besides, making himself invisible and escaping had been his backup all along. He stood tensed and listened for anything suspicious.

"Watch out!" a shout came from within the lab. A heartbeat later there was a blood curdling scream. Harry whipped around and saw two humanoid robots with blades for arms standing by the safe. One had its arm stretched with a blade bisecting the safe breaker. Red lights glowed on its body and the thug's blood slid down its arm. Harry could only watch in horror as it retracted its arm and a fountain of blood erupted from the body. The man's whimpers died in a choked sob.

Harry's wand rose as if automatically and a spell he had only seen in the Dark Lord's memories flew out of his wand. It was as if a dozen swords had fallen upon the robot at once. It flew backwards and hit the wall, its pieces falling along neatly cut lines from its body. The red lights on its body faded to black. The heavy thump thump of a robot's running feet distracted Harry from watching the dead robot.

The second one had somehow seen him despite his invisibility spell. Harry figured the thing probably had heat sensors on it. This time quite deliberately he thrust out his wand hand like a spear and a purple piercing hex shot straight into the attacking robot's face. Its head snapped back but somehow it kept coming. Harry shot the spell again and again, targeting the chest and the joints. Each spell grew in power as hate rose in Harry at these machines trying to kill him. From holes that were pencil size, they grew to fist size and finally the robot crashed at Harry's feet.

He was enraged and yelled in victory when the thing's red lights faded away. He looked for the last member of their group and found him with his neck sliced. The man's eyes were glassy and he was propped against the safe. Harry strode to the vault and glared at it. This was the reason that he had been pulled out of the kitchen where he was safe to go on this cursed job. With dark fury still singing in his veins he cursed the vault door over and over. The thick steel didn't give way but some of Harry's anger did. He began to get a hold of himself and realized to break through he would have to use spells that were more powerful than he was capable of.

Still he didn't want to give up and the sirens ringing in his ears stopped him from being totally calm and rational. So instead he tried spells for unlocking, which failed. Again, the more powerful ones were beyond him. He screamed in frustration. A part of him realized that he was giving way to Voldemort's influence in him but he couldn't bring himself to care. Voldemort's obsessive nature was what was needed at the time.

Harry's head was beginning to ache as an idea came to him. With careful movements he cast a spell on the number pad on the safe and then said clearly, "Reveal your secret." The number '3' glowed on the pad. Harry pressed it and then the number '7' glowed. Harry followed the glowing numbers and after a ten digit code the safe door ground open. Harry looked inside to find the rainbow colored crystal resting in a glass tube.

He grabbed it and slid it in his pocket just as armored police rushed into the lab. Seeing as he was disillusioned he figured it was time to get out of there without fighting them.

(scene break)

Outside Harry found the van unmanned. Neither Roman nor the woman who was with him were there. Seeing as he had been sitting in the back of the van, he had no idea of how they had gotten to the building. He only really knew how to get to The Club from the twins' apartment. He was still pondering on what to do next when Roman and the woman walked into the alley. The woman was carrying a brief case and Roman was playing with a data drive.

"Well, that went beautifully. Those boys caused the perfect distraction for us to get this information. I think we will be set for a long time, don't you?" Roman said.

"Let's go while they're still distracted," she said quietly.

"Too bad they're probably all dead by now. It's so hard to find good help," Roman said as he opened the driver side door.

Harry quashed his desire to curse Roman and the woman. He knew that he was relying too much on Voldemort's memories and attitude. Even though Roman deserved a Dementor's kiss for setting them up to die, Harry didn't want Voldemort memories to be in the driver's seat when he cursed Roman. In the shadows he dropped his spells and walked right up to Roman.

The man jumped and his cigar dropped. "Where did you come from?"

"We should go," Harry said and opened the back door of the van. When he sat down he noticed the woman's glowing eyes staring at him in the rearview mirror. "What?" he demanded.

"Did you get the crystal?" she asked evenly.

For a moment Harry wanted to lie but remembered that the mob could make the twins' life very difficult. So he slipped it out of his pocket and chucked it up front. The woman's hand whipped out to catch it before it could smash against the windshield. Roman just stared in surprised that Harry had lived and that he had gotten the crystal.

Roman shook his head and started the van. "Well…well. You're a diamond in the rough, I see. I don't mind telling you that you should be dead."

"Oh, don't worry, your little set up was obvious from the start. The others are dead, so your plan mostly worked. I hope it was worth it," Harry bit out, throwing caution to the wind.

"You survived and we all got what we wanted. Clearly this calls for a celebration," Roman carried on blithely as he pulled out of the alley, bypassing all the police cars.

The woman caught Harry's eyes again in the rearview mirror. "I'm Crimson. I'll be watching you."

Harry couldn't wait to get back so he ignored the woman and what had happened that night. He was thinking crème _brûlée for dessert. The girls and their mother would like that. The thought soothed both his light and dark sides. _

_(Chapter end)_

_A.N. So how was that? Was Roman in character enough? _


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5:

These cats were fast as lightning!

The dancers at The Club stood looking nervously at the sudden stand off in their midst. The DJ continued to pump music, bravely ignoring the violence brewing on the dance floor. On one side Roman stood with Harry and Crimson behind him, on the other were Junior and his axe gang.

"Junior, you're looking a little constipated. What's the problem?" Roman asked, his one visible eye running over the men arrayed behind Junior.

"Why is he alive when the rest didn't make it? He left them behind, didn't he?" Junior shouted.

"And what if he did?" Roman shrugged. "He finished the job. The others failed. That's all."

"But-" Junior started but shut up when Miltia and Melanie appeared out of the group of people gawking at the fight. He didn't want to show his hand in front of the twins but couldn't lose the respect of his men either. "I don't want any backstabbers in my crew. The little shit left the others to die!"

Melanie frowned at Junior then turned to Harry, "What happened?"

Crimson and Roman shot Harry a quelling look before he could answer. Harry returned it with interest and adopted Melanie's bored tone to answer, "Roman and Crimson gave us a tough job because the guys said they could handle it. They couldn't and were taken out by…the other side. I made it, obviously."

"We don't have any room for weaklings. Good job, Harry," Miltia piped up.

"She's right," Melanie added glaring at the men behind Junior. "You all knew that when you signed up for this. We're not some afterschool care club, no one is going to hold your hand and wipe your snotty noses. If you can't hack it, don't run your mouth."

"Oh I don't know, Melanie. If one of them wants to lie on my lap and have me take care of their boo-boos _permanently,_ I'll do it." Miltia said and slid her red claws against each other in warning. Junior cringed at the sound of Miltia blades and his crew looked nervously at each other at the threat of the twins.

Crimson laughed lowly which upped the tension in the group. The DJ gave up and cut the music and took cover. The woman in red started walking making the axe gang fall to the sides to get away from her. "Looks like not everyone is a pussy in this crew. Well said, girls. Now, someone get me that lobster dinner I saw earlier."

"Um…yes, ma'am," Junior stuttered and left after giving Harry one last ugly look.

Roman shook his head and shot Harry a suffering look. "You see that? I try to be diplomatic, I try to be polite, but all I get is arguments and grumblings. Crimson simply walks through them. Let that be a lesson to you, Harry."

"And what lesson is that?" Harry asked, despite himself amused by Roman's faux whining.

Melanie scoffed. "The lesson is that you don't argue with a woman."

"We're vicious." Miltia smiled sweetly at them. She linked arms with her sister and went to the bar, leaving Roman and Harry behind.

"So was that really the lesson?" Harry asked.

Roman sighed. "Not exactly but no point in arguing. Come, let's have drinks to celebrate. And, don't worry about Junior. You'll still have a job with us."

(break)

The next morning Harry woke up the girls' mother and made her breakfast. He made sure she dressed properly and brushed her hair. The woman chattered away at him, talking about her husband and her daughters. As she drank her tea, Harry stood behind her and cast diagnostic spells on her.

Harry needed a way to deal with Voldemort's memories desperately. Using them to help the broken woman was a way for him to subvert the man's ill-gotten knowledge. Unfortunately, much of the magic was either too delicate or too powerful for him to cast. So Harry did what he could to keep feeling like himself and help.

"Harry?" the woman said.

"Yes, Marry?"

"Would you like to go to the temple with me?" She smiled up at him. Harry found her eyes to be steady and her smile relaxed. It was a big change from how neurotic she had been when he had first met her.

"Sorry, not today. I have some things to figure out with the girls."

"Hmm? So which one of them do you like? You know you can't have both. Not that I mind, you're such a good boy," Marry said and went back to her tea.

Harry blushed madly. "I think they're out of my league, Marry."

There was a loud yawn behind him. Harry looked over his shoulder to find the twins in their nighties. He prayed they hadn't heard the latest attempt by their mother to set them up. He hoped they didn't notice him checking them out either. Living with two pretty girls was challenging in unexpected ways.

"You look nice, mom," Miltia said and gave her mother a kiss on her cheek.

Marry smiled. "Harry took care of me this morning. Isn't that sweet?

"Oi!" Melanie growled as she sat down. "Stop hitting on my mother, Harry!"

"Creep," Miltia whispered and shook her head sadly.

"I wasn't, you can't just say things like that!" Harry snapped.

"That's sad, you're losing out to your own mother in love. Step up your game, girls." Marry laughed.

"Mother!" the twins groaned in stereo.

"Ok," Harry said loudly, "That's my cue to leave. I'll be on the roof working out." He beat a hasty retreat out of the apartment. There was much he needed to think on.

(break)

The roof had a fence around the border, making it safe for residents to be on. A few clotheslines hung heavy with clothes. Harry stretched and enjoyed the early morning breeze. He focused his mind only on the sensation of his muscles stretching, the smells and sights around him.

After a while the girls showed up with their gym clothes on and joined him in his workout. Harry wondered how to talk to them about what was on his mind. The night before had scared him. He didn't want to be a criminal but continuing to work at The Club would only expose him to more jobs from Roman. The twins knew what they were doing and accepted their place as enforcers for the mob but Harry didn't think he could.

He liked the girls. They had been kind to him, had protected him, they were even teaching him how to fight. And last night they had stood up to Junior for him, which was something he knew was hard for Miltia to do. Both of them felt indebted and loyalty to Junior, the man had helped them when they had no one.

He didn't know what to do. He couldn't spit on everything the twins had done for him. They were strong and tough, he could rely on them, and they never judged him. The last wasn't something he could say about either Hermione or Ron. But then again, his best friends hadn't been criminals and had fought beside him in deadly situations.

"Are you going to keep staring at us or say something?" Melanie said from where she was doing splits.

Harry shook his head and realized he had been ogling the twins again. "Sorry, just a lot on my mind."

"About last night?" Miltia said.

Harry sighed and leaned against the fence. "Yeah… Guess you two want to know the details." The girls nodded so he began to tell his story. He looked for them to be outraged or upset but they took it in stride. When he was done he waited for their reactions.

"Melanie and I've been careful to not catch Roman's notice. He's insane. Being an enforcer for one of our territories is a safe enough job," Miltia said. "We'd hoped that's what you would end up as too. Anything above that and it gets riskier."

"If you hadn't trained you'd be dead now…damn it, this is trouble." Melanie moved to sit next to him, leaning against his shoulder a little. "But there's no way out of it. You'll just have to keep working hard. Because if you fail, they'll make sure you're not a problem any longer."

Harry frowned. "You mean they will kill me?"

Miltia shrugged. "That's just the way it is, Harry. If you mess up and cost them something big you pay for it. We're low on the hierarchy, so it doesn't matter much if we screw up every now and then."

"Well I'm not any higher than you are in the outfit," Harry said. "I mean I'm just a cook."

"Yeah but Roman, and maybe even Crimson, like you now. That makes things different. They'll probably give you more jobs to test you," Miltia explained.

"So what do I do?" Harry said, instead of asking 'how do I get out of it.'

"For now the only thing you can do is get strong. You don't know what they want you for yet. Maybe it will be for more heists or maybe they will want you as their personal errand runner. Either way, having the respect of enforcers is important in the group," Melanie said.

"What if…what if I don't want to do this anymore?" Harry said. The girls frowned at him but he pressed on, "Look, I'm not like you, I don't know how to handle this. Roman set us up to die, that doesn't make me want to work with him. I don't want to be involved in this."

Melanie groaned. "It's a little too late to get cold feet, Harry. It's not like you have a choice, do you? You have no background, no money, no family, no identity. How are you going to find a job elsewhere without papers."

Miltia continued, "You've got us, Harry, but this is all we have. It's not the best life, it's dangerous, but we've got respect, we've got a roof over our heads and food on the table."

"Respect?" Harry scoffed.

"That's right, _respect_. You try being without anyone looking out for you, try being alone and see how all these good people in society look at you. They ignore you, no one wants you to be their problem. You're less than human to them," Miltia said heatedly moving away from him.

"People only respect strength. It's important, Harry. The world isn't a nice place. It's a good place only for those who have money and someone to support them. For people like us, we've got to carve out our own existence," Melanie said soothingly. "It's tough but you're strong, you can do this. You've got us backing you up."

Harry didn't know what to say. The conversation was going exactly like he didn't want it to go. The girls had survival mentality; they weren't concerned about morality or the law. _No, they've never had the luxury to think about those things, they're not bad people_, he thought to himself.

Melanie suddenly laughed. Harry and Miltia looked to her askance. "You know, this could be great for us. If Harry plays his cards right he could rise up in the hierarchy and we could move with him."

Miltia smiled widely. "Move up and away from Junior!"

"What? You actually want to get away from him?" Harry was stunned, they had never shown anything but loyalty to the bastard.

"Eh, I don't think it's too long before he'll expect us to be his girlfriends," Miltia said.

Melanie shuddered. "He's nice and all, but he's so _old_."

"Right, because being old is the only reason why you wouldn't want to go out with him," Harry said sarcastically. "You know he's just a douche bag."

The twins giggled. "You don't have to be jealous, Harry. Besides, if you want to save us from him you just have to rise in the ranks," Miltia said.

"Thanks, no pressure." Harry rolled his eyes, playing along with their teasing. Inside he felt his stomach clench in worry. He had been thinking of how to get away but the girls had tied their hopes to him – how could he run now?

(break)

The next few weeks brought a lot of changes for Harry. Whenever Roman or Crimson visited Junior had him work at the bar. That way if his superiors needed Harry, he was right there. So Harry got to learn a little about serving drinks and was stolen by Melanie every now and then to dance. Junior would grit his teeth and accept it.

Miltia and Melanie upped their training regimen along with Harry. They still didn't know why Harry sometimes got bursts of speed and other times just couldn't. The twins regularly outpaced him, moving fast enough to dodge bullets. That said, Harry had never felt healthier in his life. Lifting in the gym, sparring with the girls, and eating with Voldemort's refined palette had him growing strong at an unprecedented rate.

He worried for the girls however, they needed a teacher to take them to the next level but there was no one who could help them. By the same token they needed someone to find out why Harry couldn't move like they did. Secretly Harry imagined that it had to do with him being from another world. Perhaps there was something about the humans in the twins' world that was different.

(break)

Harry stood as stilly as he could in the courtyard of the apartment block. He was delving deep into one of Voldemort's memories. The man had mastered some of the most dangerous and volatile magic in the world. Such magic required a level of concentration and mastery of will that Harry had only experienced in life or death situations.

Harry felt that mastering his mind and will was the only way he could deal with the agony and disorientation that came with Voldemort's memories. It was also the way to learn occlumency and learn the sort of magic that was beyond him as he was.

Harry watched from Voldemort's eyes as he met teachers of mind arts and meditation. He saw those aligned with the light try to teach him about compassion and denial of self. To reach unification with nature and bend it to the will he would have to let his anger and desire go.

Obviously, Voldemort was not fond of this philosophy and he took what he could from them but found a way to flourish under the masters of dark arts who taught him about the mind. Their way was of control of self and surrounding. Such powerful mastery of emotion and ones own mind that they became slaves to one's will instead of the other way around.

Since Voldemort understood the latter way the best, it was what Harry was learning too. It reminded him of his years with the Dursleys. When he had learned to not show emotion. When he had learned that crying was letting them win. Even as a child he had made himself capable of letting his emotions go and just exist because that was the only way to survive. Harry realized that it wasn't until he went to Hogwarts and got spoiled by friends and acceptance that he forgot these lessons he had learned the hard way.

Something sharp sliced across his cheek. He leapt back and saw Melanie coming out of a spin. The tip of the blade on her right heel flashed red. He touched his cheek and his hand came away with blood on it. Melanie smirked at him and got into stance. Harry's heart raced, she looked divine.

He whipped his hand out making the blood fly at her. A silent incantation turned the blood into jagged red knives. Melanie ducked but the three blades followed her to the ground striking her across her arms and in her side. She screamed and jumped at Harry. Her legs spun in a flurry of anger.

Harry took the punishment on his arms, careful to keep the wand away from her kicks. The girls had taken an unhealthy interest in trying to break it during fights. Melanie threw a straight kick at him; he blocked it with his leg and realized his mistake when pain shot from under his knee. Melanie's heel dagger had plunged straight into his shin. "Fuck!" He threw out a punch at the girl's face that she neatly caught and twisted.

He cast a wand less spell to repel her from the hand that she had caught. She was thrown away and in the same instant Harry noticed a shadow growing large on the ground. He threw himself on the ground and pointed his wand up. Miltia was falling fast at him, her claws extended. He banished her into the sky and dragged himself away, putting his back to the wall of the apartment building. He needed a minute to heal his leg.

Miltia somersaulted in the air and landed on her feet. Both girls had gotten comfortable at being thrown by some invisible force. They had taught themselves to react accordingly.

"Very good, Harry. Your reaction speed has gotten very fast," Miltia said.

Harry watched curiously as Melanie healed herself. She seemed to glow for a heartbeat and the wounds left by his transfigured daggers just disappeared. It was another mystery that he hadn't figured out yet. It seemed like a common everyday sort of thing for the girls. He didn't want them looking at him strangely for not knowing what they were doing.

"You're getting stronger but if I go harder I can still take you," Melanie said.

Miltia shrugged. "We've been fighting for years, he can't learn everything in a few weeks. He's coming along fine."

"He needs to be faster. His weapon is made of wood. One good hit and it will be destroyed. Then what?" Melanie snapped.

"Melanie," Miltia reproached quietly.

Harry sighed. "She's right…I just don't know what we can do about it. I can keep training until I get good enough."

"You know Signal teaches students to make their own weapons. Wouldn't it be fun?" Miltia said.

Harry shot a look to Melanie, silently telling her to curb her temper. The white clad girl always made fun of her twin's obsession with school and becoming a huntress. She saw no point to daydreaming. "We should probably head to The Club. Junior is expecting Roman tonight, he wants me at the bar."

Melanie smiled widely. "Good, we can continue your training on the dance floor."

Harry groaned. "How is dancing training? You just like embarrassing me."

"Dancing requires coordination and rhythm. You've gotten much better with your footwork after dancing with Melanie," Miltia said.

"And it's fun embarrassing you." Melanie grinned.

Harry grumbled and followed the girls. Embarrassing or not, having the twins in his arms on the dance floor was great. It was too bad they preferred the faster songs, dancing to which felt more like a sparring session than dancing.

(break)

The laser lights of the club flashed red and white. The DJ was someone who moonlighted as the mob's hitman. The odd man wore the head part of a bear costume to hide his features. It reminded him of Luna's lion head that she wore to their quidditch games.

He was idly wiping glasses behind the bar when Roman approached him. "Roman," Harry greeted, reaching for the man's favorite drink.

Roman held up a hand to stop him. "Not thirsty. Two days from now be ready to go. We have a job planned for the afternoon. Hope you like trains."

"Love them, in fact. What does it have to with the job?" Harry asked.

"How do you feel about a classic train heist? Practically a rite of passage won't you say?" Roman smiled.

Harry didn't want to say that he didn't feel good about any heist. Although stealing was better than killing, so it could be worse. "Is this going to be like last time?"

"Possibly, but that's why you're along for the ride," Roman answered breezily. Harry stopped wiping the glass in his hand and glared at the orange haired man. "Now, now. Crimson and I will be there. And we will have some heavy hitters to help out." He looked up at the balcony where the DJ was set up and nodded. The man in the bear's head nodded back.

"I see, as long as it's not another set up for me to die," Harry said.

"Perish the thought, Crimson would toast me alive for taking away her favorite cook. What _do_ you spike her food with? She can't get enough of it."

"It's made with love," Harry deadpanned. "The best spice in the world."

Roman threw back his head and laughed. "You're so fun to tease, Harry. Now I must go ruin Junior's day."

Harry leaned against the shelf with all the bottles and let the music wash over him. It had been a good few weeks. He had cooked, trained with the twins, spent time getting his mind under control, but it seemed the holiday was over. He hoped nothing would go wrong on this next job.

He watched as Junior's expression soured as Roman talked to him. Never one to miss the chance of seeing Junior unhappy Harry moved down the bar to where the man was nursing a whisky.

Out of the corner of his eye Harry noticed someone walking up to the bar. It was a girl around his age with a wild mane of golden hair going below her waist. Wide violet eyes danced in some private amusement. She attracted the attention of the men without even trying. Harry reached Junior's end of the bar just as she did. He shoved the bartender there out of the way. The man knowing Harry's new status moved off without complaint.

"Strawberry sunrise, no ice," The blonde said to him, "Oh and one of those umbrellas." Her smile just about made Harry's heart melt. He chuckled at the request for the umbrella.

"Aren't you a little young to be in this club, blondie?" Junior grumbled, turning to the girl. Harry held himself from ventilating Junior there and then.

The girl laughed, "Aren't you a little old to have a name like Junior."

"Oh zing," Harry said as he mixed her drink. She turned to wink at him and Harry felt the tops of his ears burn. Junior shot Harry a loathing look.

"So you know who I am," he said. "You gotta name, sweetheart?"

"Yes, Junior, I've got several, but instead of sweetheart, you can call me _sir!_" She grabbed Junior by the balls and squeezed making the man squeal. Harry thought Christmas had come early.

He watched happily as the girl started interrogating Junior. The axe gang showed up to defend their boss but Harry held up his hand to hold them back. Technically he wasn't their superior, but he was under the twins' protection, which gave him de facto power. Not to mention he was Crimson's personal chef.

The girl was trying to find out about some woman. Harry tried to catch a look at the picture but couldn't make it out. He hoped that Junior wasn't running some sort of kidnapping ring.

"Look, Blondie, sir, if you want to make it out of this club alive, I suggest you let me go, now!" Junior choked out. Harry tensed; he imagined she wouldn't be making it out alive regardless. Junior couldn't let her go and lose respect.

"Oh, c'mon, let's kiss and make up!" the girl said is a playful way, following Junior to the dance floor. Harry just stared at her in disbelief. Junior was going to kill her for messing with him.

"Huh…okay," Junior said. Harry slapped his head in disgust. The girl was around Harry's age making her far too young for Junior. They leaned toward each other but right before they could lock lips the blonde threw a straight right knocking Junior through a glass pillar and into the bar. A bottle rolled and hit his head.

Harry couldn't help himself and laughed. "Drinks for you are on the house, miss!" he yelled.

"Awww, thanks! A fan! I'm so popular!" she crowed and shot him a bright smile.

The dancers started running out of the club but the DJ continued with the music. Before Harry could decide to intervene and stop the gang from attacking her the bracelets on her arms started to transform. They changed to become full gauntlet and arm guard piece.

She flew into the air as the gang rushed her. As she came down she turned so she could slam her fist into the floor. A great shockwave burst from where she landed and threw everyone to the ground. The lightshow turned to red. Harry wondered if the DJ was insane, trying to mix beats to her moves and match the lightshow to the mood.

With the speed she moved Harry figured she was trained like the twins. In that case he didn't really need to step in to protect her. Despite that he drew his wand and waited warily. The girl shot fire and kinetic blasts from her gauntlets, and moved so fast that the greater number of the mob was no match for her. She attacked mostly using her fists and legs, using her weapons to add speed and strength to her moves.

The DJ suddenly pulled out a machine gun and started spraying the dance floor. Harry whipped his wand out and spelled a shield around the blonde. The girl noticed the white shimmer around her but didn't break her pace as she zigzagged across the floor and jumped on the DJ's balcony. A double kick knocked him back. For a moment she was hidden from Harry's sight but he saw her again when she picked the DJ bodily and threw him off the balcony.

"Melanie, who is this girl?" Harry heard Miltia and the sound of her heels. Melanie was standing cross-armed looking at the blonde condescendingly. "I don't know, Miltia, but we should teach her a lesson."

The blonde changed the cartridges of her weapons in anticipation of fighting the twins. "Girls, I think we can talk this out, right?" Harry said. He knew the twins could be cruel and the blonde was powerful as well. He didn't see this ending well for either of them.

"Don't worry, I can handle them, cutie!" the blonde yelled to Harry and jumped off the balcony firing at the twins.

The twins tumbled back avoiding the bullets. Harry felt his blood run cold. He didn't want to see them die. He leapt over the counter but Miltia shouted to him. "We've got this, Harry, she's too strong for you."

Harry grit his teeth but held back. He didn't want the twins to be distracted if he entered the fray. They were used to fighting together, he would mess with their coordination. As usual the twins attacked in tandem while the blonde shot at them with her gauntlets. Melanie leapt and sliced bullets coming at her with her heel blades. At that point Harry knew he was outclassed. He had never been able to move at that speed consistently. At best he could snipe when the opportunity appeared.

The twins had the blonde on the defensive with their rotating attacks. Both Melanie and Miltia cut in her several times but the blonde managed to heal herself in the same way the twins did. Suddenly the blonde was thrown back, but she got up swiftly and used her gauntlets' fire to propel herself at the twins faster that even before. She took Melanie by surprise. This only served to make Miltia furious who attacked the blonde furiously with her claws.

By then Harry had fought the girls enough times to recognize when they were falling into their favorite combination attacks. Miltia had unconsciously done the same. That would be a mistake against him but he hoped that the blonde who hadn't ever fought them before would be caught by the attacks.

Miltia cut into the blonde's face, barely missing her violet eyes. Melanie appeared from above plunging her bladed heels into the blonde's shoulders. The blonde screamed in pain, closing her eyes for a split second. Miltia took the opening to backhand the girl with her claws.

The blonde spun in the air from the force of Miltia's blow and fell to the ground. The twins stood, breathing hard over her. Miltia idly removed the tufts of hair she had inadvertently sliced off when she hit the blonde.

The fallen girl stared at the falling locks from Miltia's claws in horror. Harry felt a sudden rise in the temperature of the room. It felt like it was boiling. The fallen blonde jumped to her feet, her golden mane seemed to be made of fire instead of hair and flames licked all over her body. Her eyes, which Harry had admired, were a glowing red.

Harry's heart raced in fear for the twins but he didn't sense the same sort of menace that Voldemort exuded or other dark creatures he had met. So he held himself back. The blonde attacked with a fury unseen before. She moved so fast that she might as well have been flying on a racing broom. The twins couldn't match the speed as the blonde threw an uppercut at Miltia, making her fly from the floor to balcony. She caught Melanie mid kick and slammed her into the ground. Melanie groaned and rolled on her stomach but didn't get up.

Harry thrust his wand out in a stabbing motion throwing out a sizzling bolt of lightning. It hit the blonde, slamming her into a far wall and snaked across her body for a long ten seconds of agony. He ran to Melanie who was groaning on the ground. "Melanie! Melanie!" He knelt down to look at her face to make sure she was breathing.

"I'm," she coughed, "fine. Healing already. Check Miltia."

Harry felt relief flood his veins and left her there to run up to Miltia. He found her similarly recovering. Below Junior had gotten his hand on a bazooka that he was firing at the blonde. The girl was drunkenly dodging fire because her limbs were still twitching from electric shock. Again fear for the girl's life gripped Harry. He had attacked her to stop her from hurting his friends but that didn't mean he wanted Junior to kill her.

He took a moment to check his surroundings. Everyone was either knocked out or had run away. Harry was free to use magic. He cast an _impedimenta_ at Junior, slowing his movements. The blonde took the opportunity and rushed at him gracelessly. The punch she threw broke Junior's jaw and knocked him out. She shot up his bazooka and destroyed it too. Finally she fell to the steps leading up to the bar, breathing hard.

Harry wiped the sweat off his brow and went back down to the bar. Melanie had already dragged herself off the floor, and Miltia was safe on the balcony. He reached behind the bar and grabbed a drink. He took it down to where the blonde was sprawled and sat next to her.

"Your strawberry sunrise with the umbrella," he said. He put an arm around her to help her sit straight and felt the tremors going through her body. He winced at the memory of what he had done to her. The spell was dark magic, not simply an elemental spell. It was going to hurt her for a while.

The blonde breathed deeply. "Wow, you sure are nice." She took the drink and sipped it slowly, twitching every now and then. Behind her back, Harry cast a healing spell to relax her muscles and the counter-curse. He wasn't surprised to see that most of the damage the twins had done to her had already disappeared. "You don't look like you should be working here," she said.

"What do you mean?" Harry asked.

"Well, you cheered me on when I was picking on your boss and you're being nice to me even after I beat up your girlfriends. Shouldn't you be trying to kill me, right now?" Suddenly her violet eyes grew round. "Wait, are you poisoning me! Is this poison?"

Harry shook his head and snatched the drink from her hand to take a sip and return it to her. "No, not poison. And, I already got my revenge for you attacking my _friends_."

She grinned mischievously at him. Harry was sad to see her great mane was a little lopsided now after Miltia's attack. "So you're not taken then. I'm Yang." She put out her hand.

Harry took the gloved hand and smiled. "I'm Harry, nice to meet you. Why are you here, anyway?"

"Eh, an interview. What did you shoot at me, I can't shake it?" she shuddered.

"Sorry, when I saw you beating the twins, I lost it for a second and went overboard. It will pass in a day. You're already recovered a lot, I'm impressed," Harry said, trying to not feel too guilty. "So what's this about an interview?"

She rolled her eyes up as if trying to remember. "I'm not sure I can say…technically, you're a bad guy. You still haven't told me how someone like you can be working for the mob."

Harry grinned, thinking he had deflected her from that thought. "Like someone told me, we've all got to survive somehow. Besides, I'm not a bad guy."

"So you're a good guy who works for bad guys?" Yang chuckled.

"Hey, I could've poisoned you but I didn't." Harry grinned back. She stood up with a laugh getting ready to go. "Before you go," he said, and reached for the side of her hair that had been shorn off. His wand was carefully tucked in the sleeve, close enough to cast magic. Yang looked nervously at him as he ran his hand through her shortened hair. As his fingers reached the ends the locks began to lengthen and within seconds were back to normal.

Yang pulled her hair around her shoulder so she could pet it and marvel at the restoration. She looked at him with an intensity that made him self-conscious. Before he could say anything she grabbed him and dipped his head back. Her lips were upon his in a second and soon he was tasting her strawberry sunrise flavored tongue in his mouth. It was as if magic, liquid fire, and tingling ice rushed over his skin and in his veins. It was very different than Cho's kiss.

Yang broke the kiss and smiled. "Hey, see you around some time?"

Harry nodded more than a little bamboozled. "You know where to find me."

"Next time I'll fight _you_." Yang bared her teeth in fierce smile.

Harry's heart raced as he watched her go. He was intensely happy that the twins hadn't seen that whole episode.

(break)

Glynda Goodwitch pressed repeat on the tablet watching the scene of Harry Potter casting a shield around Yang Xiao Long to protect her from bullets. "He can displace his own aura to protect another? Incredible."

"I'm not sure, ma'am. He doesn't seem to use his aura much. It's very erratic. It's almost as if he doesn't know how," the huntress on surveillance duty added.

Glynda looked up at the woman dressed in a green cloak, her deep hood hid her face. "How can that be, Robin? His transmutation skills betray a high level of training."

"But, as you've observed yourself, his skills are unorthodox and by his own admission he is from someplace with only a single moon."

"You don't honestly believe he is from a different world altogether, Robin." Glynda did not look amused.

Robin shrugged but the cloak hid most of her gesture. "He is unusual, ma'am. In other news, it seems that Crimson has taken notice of him."

Glynda Goodwitch's eyes narrowed. "Is he compromised?"

"I cannot say. I have only observed her watching him beyond asking him to cook complex dishes for her."

"I see, then we must move fast before she learns of his talents." Goodwitch stood. "I'm going to fly out there tonight. Have you set up the meeting?"

Robin nodded. "Yes. A rival gang will start trouble on their way to work tomorrow. It will separate the twins from him. You will be able to speak with him privately."

"Thank you for your good work, Robin. As always, keep all you know of him to yourself. Oh, any observations on Yang Xiao Long?"

"She lacks subtlety but has spunk. I like her. She will be good for Beacon," Robin said happily.

Glynda sighed, "So she will be a discipline problem."

"I was a discipline problem, ma'am and I turned out great," Robin said.

Goodwitch pinned the senior huntress with a glare. "You continue to be a problem, Robin Greenhelm." Seeing the woman hunch, Goodwitch softened her tone, "but you were always talented. Miss Xiao Long will be admitted to Beacon."

"Thank you, ma'am." Robin bowed and melted into the shadows. She had kept the recording of Yang kissing Harry from Glynda. It would make good blackmail material someday.

(Chapter end)

AN. Whew that was fun to write. Some of it wrote itself. How do you all like the revelation of who our secret agent huntress is? And Yang too of course. Also curious to hear your reactions to the twins response to Harry's situation. Cheers!


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